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Valerie Johnson & Al B Blue

Nipomo, California, United States | SELF

Duo Blues Americana

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"Valerie Johnson: The Smokin' Hot Queen of Blues"

Magazine crowns Valerie as the, Smokin' Hot Queen of Blues! Pages 14 & 15 - Journal Plus/Natasha Dalton

"Valerie Johnson: The Smokin' Hot Queen of Blues"

Magazine crowns Valerie as the, Smokin' Hot Queen of Blues! Pages 14 & 15 - Journal Plus/Natasha Dalton

"School of........Blues"

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<h1 style="font-size: 2em; text-align: center;">School of … Blues </h1>
<h2 style="font-size: 1.5em; text-align: center;">Blues For Youth Comes To Cleveland Elementary</h2>
The fifth graders at Cleveland Elementary have just finished performing at a school assembly, the culmination of the Santa Barbara Blues Society’s Blues for Youth program. While the boys spill across the auditorium floor to roughhouse, the girls form a circle around Valerie Johnson to ask if she is married to Al B Blue, the partner with whom she has given the students a seven-week crash course in blues music. As word ripples around the crowd of girls that indeed the two are married, one sighs, pirouettes, and falls on her back.
That Johnson and Blue (who refuses to share the name his mother gave him) have so strongly endeared themselves to the kids in six 45-minute sessions is almost as impressive as the fact that they actually taught them how to sing and play blues music.
They downplay the accomplishment, however. “Kids are sponges,” says Al. “If you don’t tell kids something is hard, they just do it,” adds Johnson.
<img style="float: left; margin: 7px; border: 1px solid black;" src="http://ats.vjblues.com/img/Franklin_5thGrade_SMILE_sm.jpg" alt="Franklin School, Santa Barbara, 5th grade class " width="300" height="208" />The Santa Barbara Blues Society — whose members love to point out that, founded 1977, it is the oldest in the country — first won grants to do educational outreach in 2005 which have since been bolstered by matching funds from the Santa Barbara Bowl.
Johnson and Blue, along with Cleveland’s teachers, tied the blues lessons into the fifth grade U.S. History curriculum on slavery. “I date the blues to when the slaves were stolen from their villages and sold on the auction block,” Johnson says. She explains that the call-and-response format central to African-American music and religion began with a “field holler” when new slaves, who did not share a common language, would call out to each other with guttural sounds to express their pain and sorrow.
The Cleveland students read aloud a short play about the history of Harriet Tubman before they performed a song about Tubman to the tune of Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way.” (Yes, Tubman was “born a slave.”) Building on the theme of the Underground Railroad, they also sang a medley of spirituals made up of “Run Mary Run,” “Way Over in Beulah Land,” and “Wade in the Water.” Johnson explained to her audience—the rest of the school’s students—that Beulah Land represents freedom and that when slaves directed runaways to enter a body of water, it was so that they could hide their scent from hunting dogs.
The slavery lesson over, Cleveland students also sang an original tune called “The Walls Shake,” before Johnson lilted a call and response song called “Little Red Rooster” where students cock-a-doodle-dooed, wolfed, and howled. She finished with, “Let the Good Times Roll.”
Al B Blue played lead guitar on his cream-colored Fender Stratocaster throughout, but he was accompanied by students on lap steels, guitars, washboards, a drum made out of an old cheese roll and homemade diddley bows fashioned out of two-by-fours and decorated with stickers.
Blue and Johnson, Nipomo residents, both sport impressive resumes as performance musicians, but they’ve been working with kids all over the country for 15 years. Johnson says that, even though blues might not be the most popular genre on the radio, kids can dig on it because, “Blues is about how life is, not how you want it to be.” In fact it’s so much about real life, says Blues for Youth Coordinator Rosemarie Keller, that it’s sometimes hard to find songs with appropriate lyrics for young children.
</div> - Santa Barbara Independent/Brandon Fastman

"School of........Blues"

"Ann About Town: Proudly Singin' the Birthday Blues"

<div style="color: #000000; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: #ffffff; margin: 8px;">
<h1 class="entry-title single-entry-title" style="font-size: 30px; padding-top: 10px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; outline-width: 0px; outline-style: initial; outline-color: initial; vertical-align: baseline; font-weight: normal; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px;">ANN ABOUT TOWN: Proudly Singin’ the Birthday Blues</h1>
<img style="float: left; margin: 7px; border: 0px initial initial;" src="http://ats.vjblues.com/img/Peyrat-Ann3-200x300.jpg" alt="photo of Ann Peyrat, columnist for Montecito Messenger" width="150" height="163" />Break out the birthday candles—the Santa Barbara Blues Society is turning 35 next month.
As the oldest blues society in the country, SBBS has been bringing the party to town in the form of concerts and performers all these years, and like a present to the community, is now cultivating and educating a new crop of young fans, thanks to the support of a matching gift from the Santa Barbara Bowl Educational Outreach program.
With its Blues for Youth program, SBBS is reaching out to local elementary and junior high schools, helping the students to grow and appreciate the African-American blues tradition, rich with powerful meaning, strong beats and guttural grooves.
“This is the first time that we’ve done it with elementary school students,” said Blues for Youth Coordinator, Rosemarie Keller. “And we’re doing fifth grade because it fits in with their American history [curriculum] and the living theater, as you’ll see,” she said at Cleveland School’s assembly presentation on March 1.
<img style="float: right; margin: 7px; border: 1px solid black;" src="http://ats.vjblues.com/img/Cleveland-5th-gr-class-Mrs-Littmans_noLogo.jpg" alt="Cleveland School 5th grade class with Diddley Bo they made, Santa Barbara Blues for Kids program" width="300" height="218" />
Two classes, MK Littman’s and Lisa Minotto’s, sat in nervous anticipation on stage at one end of the cafetorium, while the rest of the school buzzed with excitement as they filed in and sat on the floor in front of a sprinkling of parents, community members and guests.
“Listen up! Listen up!” alerted music instructor Valerie Johnson, at one point, asking the kids to close their mouths and quietly take their seats.
Over the course of six weeks, one 45-minute session a week for each classroom, “Miss Val,” as she’s called, a
nd her partner Al B Blue, taught the close to 50 fifth graders about the blues, its history, and breathing techniques for singing. Additionally, the students learned to play instruments, such as the guitar, lap steel, diddley bow (a traditional one-string instrument used in the blues), washboard, makeshift drums out of a box and a wooden cheese wheel, shakers, and the bones (fashioned out of wood, rather than two customary rib bones).
“Val understands kids so well and they’re just enraptured by her,” whispered Keller’s friend Debbie Talmage, next to me in the audience.
Indeed, she captured the attention of everyone in the room as she told of the blues being a way of expressing feelings and coping with life, especially a tough one, like that of a 19th Century slave.
“One of the teachers here [Littman], really, really went all out and she got in touch with the Harriet Tubman Museum in New York, so they sent their brochure and were in communication [even Skyping online] with the students,” said Keller, who’s going to be sending the museum a copy of the video being filmed from the back of the room, of Littman’s class reciting a readers theater on how Tubman’s Underground Railroad series of safe houses and routes helped U.S. slaves escape to a life of freedom.
Then, led by Miss Val’s “a one, two … a one, two three four!” both fifth-grade classes set about singing old blues and old gospel-style call and response songs, including a compilation of Run, Mary, Run (about escape), Way Over in Beulah Land (finding freedom), and Wade in the Water (evading tracking hounds).
Audience participation was a big hit in Little Red Rooster, a song that called out “crow,” to a responding “cock-a-doodle-doo”; “and the dogs begin to bark,” to a comeback of “woof, woof, woof”; and “the hounds begin to howl,” the audience answering, “ahrooo!”
Each class even wrote and performed their own 16-bar blues song. “It’s all on their own; they have total ownership of this, and th - Montecito Messenger/Ann Payrat

"Ann About Town: Proudly Singin' the Birthday Blues"

<div style="color: #000000; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: #ffffff; margin: 8px;">
<h1 class="entry-title single-entry-title" style="font-size: 30px; padding-top: 10px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; outline-width: 0px; outline-style: initial; outline-color: initial; vertical-align: baseline; font-weight: normal; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px;">ANN ABOUT TOWN: Proudly Singin’ the Birthday Blues</h1>
<img style="float: left; margin: 7px; border: 0px initial initial;" src="http://ats.vjblues.com/img/Peyrat-Ann3-200x300.jpg" alt="photo of Ann Peyrat, columnist for Montecito Messenger" width="150" height="163" />Break out the birthday candles—the Santa Barbara Blues Society is turning 35 next month.
As the oldest blues society in the country, SBBS has been bringing the party to town in the form of concerts and performers all these years, and like a present to the community, is now cultivating and educating a new crop of young fans, thanks to the support of a matching gift from the Santa Barbara Bowl Educational Outreach program.
With its Blues for Youth program, SBBS is reaching out to local elementary and junior high schools, helping the students to grow and appreciate the African-American blues tradition, rich with powerful meaning, strong beats and guttural grooves.
“This is the first time that we’ve done it with elementary school students,” said Blues for Youth Coordinator, Rosemarie Keller. “And we’re doing fifth grade because it fits in with their American history [curriculum] and the living theater, as you’ll see,” she said at Cleveland School’s assembly presentation on March 1.
<img style="float: right; margin: 7px; border: 1px solid black;" src="http://ats.vjblues.com/img/Cleveland-5th-gr-class-Mrs-Littmans_noLogo.jpg" alt="Cleveland School 5th grade class with Diddley Bo they made, Santa Barbara Blues for Kids program" width="300" height="218" />
Two classes, MK Littman’s and Lisa Minotto’s, sat in nervous anticipation on stage at one end of the cafetorium, while the rest of the school buzzed with excitement as they filed in and sat on the floor in front of a sprinkling of parents, community members and guests.
“Listen up! Listen up!” alerted music instructor Valerie Johnson, at one point, asking the kids to close their mouths and quietly take their seats.
Over the course of six weeks, one 45-minute session a week for each classroom, “Miss Val,” as she’s called, a
nd her partner Al B Blue, taught the close to 50 fifth graders about the blues, its history, and breathing techniques for singing. Additionally, the students learned to play instruments, such as the guitar, lap steel, diddley bow (a traditional one-string instrument used in the blues), washboard, makeshift drums out of a box and a wooden cheese wheel, shakers, and the bones (fashioned out of wood, rather than two customary rib bones).
“Val understands kids so well and they’re just enraptured by her,” whispered Keller’s friend Debbie Talmage, next to me in the audience.
Indeed, she captured the attention of everyone in the room as she told of the blues being a way of expressing feelings and coping with life, especially a tough one, like that of a 19th Century slave.
“One of the teachers here [Littman], really, really went all out and she got in touch with the Harriet Tubman Museum in New York, so they sent their brochure and were in communication [even Skyping online] with the students,” said Keller, who’s going to be sending the museum a copy of the video being filmed from the back of the room, of Littman’s class reciting a readers theater on how Tubman’s Underground Railroad series of safe houses and routes helped U.S. slaves escape to a life of freedom.
Then, led by Miss Val’s “a one, two … a one, two three four!” both fifth-grade classes set about singing old blues and old gospel-style call and response songs, including a compilation of Run, Mary, Run (about escape), Way Over in Beulah Land (finding freedom), and Wade in the Water (evading tracking hounds).
Audience participation was a big hit in Little Red Rooster, a song that called out “crow,” to a responding “cock-a-doodle-doo”; “and the dogs begin to bark,” to a comeback of “woof, woof, woof”; and “the hounds begin to howl,” the audience answering, “ahrooo!”
Each class even wrote and performed their own 16-bar blues song. “It’s all on their own; they have total ownership of this, and th - Montecito Messenger/Ann Payrat

"Peace Park Raises Over $1,000 for Mother's for Peace"

On a recent warm, sunny Saturday, an old-fashioned peace “happening” took place up a windy canyon dirt road near Nipomo.

Signs attached to trees beckoned drivers: “Camels for Peace,” “Giraffes for Peace” and “Zebras for Peace.”

When we arrived at the Los Berros Peace Park, we were greeted by a white Guinea hen.

People were dressed hippie style: tie-dye outfits, lots of beads, peace signs and multiple designs and colors. A rock ’n’ roll band with a ’60s sound was performing on the bandstand, with a Janis Joplin-like sound (minus the bottle in paper bag).

A sumptuous array of homemade food decorated a large table.

A wine and beer table stood nearby. People were dancing, sitting on the ground eating and happily greeting friends.

Another table held various objects to be raffled, such as a tie-dye baby outfit, handmade cotton aprons, bottles of wine, cacti and two nights in the “fallout shelter.”

The “fallout shelter,” painted in bright yellow with the nuclear radiation symbol on the front, was a trailer with a bed and stove inside.

Laurie Laughlin and her partner, Chaz Andree, who’ve been living on the property for 12 years, decided to create a peace park six years ago.

Laurie grew up in Los Angeles. In 1975, along with her two daughters and ex-husband she drove up and down the coast looking for a peaceful place to live.

They fell in love with this area.

The idea of the peace park came out of “my frustration with the Iraq war,” Laurie said.

About five years ago, they cleared rocks, which went to create a labyrinth on the property. People brought plants, two olive trees and sculptures.

They made multiple mosaics and turned CDs into peace signs and hung them from the trees.

Even the cement blocks have peace signs encased in them.

“It was a love thing,” she added. “It has given us all great joy.”

Each year, they’ve had an Earth Day celebration around the spring equinox.

This year, they decided to make it a benefit for anti-nuclear group Mothers for Peace.

The event brought in $1,000 through the raffle, and wine and beer sales, the most money any of their events have made. All was donated to Mothers for Peace.

The crowd pleasing music at the peace event was provided by Valerie Johnson and Al B. Blue Blues Band — with Valerie doing the Janis Joplin-like vocals. Songwriter Cliff Stepp, singers Jani Baldwin and Dana Bailey also performed.

Gayle Cuddy’s column runs every other week in South County?Beat. Anyone with story ideas involving interesting people in the South County can reach her at 489-1026 or nightengayles@aol.com.

Read more: http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2011/05/17/1605110/south-county-beat-hey-man-benefit.html#ixzz1NaFkH5RQ
- San Luis Obispo Tribune

"Blues RoundUp 2001"

"Valerie Johnson is a blues vocalist who can “belt the blues” with the power and conviction of Koko Taylor, Etta James and Janis Joplin (which is why she was selected to tour with Big Brother and the Holding Company.)"

Bob Oberg, Pres. SLO Blues Society, San Luis Obispo, CA - SLO Blues Society

"A Universal Performer"

“Valerie is probably about as universal a performer - with a broad
repertoire - as we could get. It would be fun to have her and Al .... back on the series." Curtis Reinhardt, Event Coordinator for Arroyo Grande Rotary Club’s Summer Music Series
- Rotary Club, Arroyo Grande, CA

"A Universal Performer"

Discography

Valerie Johnson & Al B Blue
"What Kind of Blue is This?"
(also on Jango Radio)
1. What Kind of Blue is This?
2. Hesitation Blues
3. I Know You Rider
4. Comfort Me
5. Wondering Blues
6. Ain't Done With You Yet
7. Magic
8. Trouble in Mind
9. St. James Infirmary Blues

Karen Tyler & Valerie Johnson
Old, New, Borrowed & Blue
1. Texicali Blue – Karen Tyler
2. Alone & Ablue – Karen Tyler
3. I Know You Rider – Traditional
4. You Shone The Light – Karen Tyler
5. Bumble Bee – Memphis Minney
6. Big Bright Life – Karen Tyler
7. Hesitation Blues - Traditional
8. Two Hearts – Karen Tyler
9. Big Boss Man – Al Smith & Luther Dixon
10. Stars in Heaven - Karen Tyler
11. My God’s Right On Time – Valerie Johnson
12. Don’t Sugar Me – Karen Tyler
13. Encourage My Soul – Traditional

Rockin’ Out – June 3rd 1999
1. Down On Me – Big Brother & the Holding Co – vocals Valerie Johnson
2. Combination of the Two - Big Brother & the Holding Co – vocals Valerie Johnson
3. Call On Me - Big Brother & the Holding Co – vocals Valerie Johnson
4. Woman is Loser - Big Brother & the Holding Co – vocals Valerie Johnson
5. Something Tells Me – Cosmo
6. You and Me – Cosmo
7. The Bud Monster – Harvey Mandel and the Electric Snake Band
8. What Comes Around Goes Around - Harvey Mandel and the Electric Snake Band
9. Wade In The Water - Harvey Mandel and the Electric Snake Band
10. Mad Dog -Harvey Mandel and the Electric Snake Band

Night Shift – Produced by Bill Brader
1. Coffee Bean – featured -Valerie Johnson
2. It’s All Mine – Bill Brader
3. Piece of the Pie – Steve Phillip
4. Headstone – Alan Whitsett
5. Train to Memphis – Instrumental
6. Hey Jesse – Bill Brader
7. Lady In Waiting - featured -Valerie Johnson
8. Your Pushin’ It – Steve Phillip
9. Slow Dancing – Instrumental
10. Border Blues – featured -Valerie Johnson
11. Travel Man – Steve Phillip
12. T.G.I. F. - featured -Valerie Johnson
13. Blue Collar Way – Alan Whitsett
http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?pid=7194887 - To hear and read bio/review

Blueshawk - Valerie Johnson & The Blues Doctors
1. All Over You – Charles “Doc” Foreman
2. Keep Your Dream Alive - Charles “Doc” Foreman
3. Wandering Blues – Andy Kulikowski
4. Do You Know What I’m Feeling? - Charles “Doc” Foreman-
5. Confess - Charles “Doc” Foreman
6. Midnight Shuffle – Andy Kulikowski
7. I Won’t Forget You - Charles “Doc” Foreman
8. Promises - Charles “Doc” Foreman
9. 9. Another Day - Charles “Doc” Foreman
10. Listen To Me - Charles “Doc” Foreman
11. Last Thing On Your Mind - Charles “Doc” Foreman
12. Crossroads – Robert Johnson

SLO UNPLUGGED
(compilation CD benefit for Women's Shelter)
Valerie Johnson & the Blues Doctors -
"Swing Low Sweet Chariot"

DVD's

1. Celebrity Cruise Ship – 2009 Talent Show Winner, Valerie Johnson, performing, "I Feel Good"
2. The Ballad of Dorothy Dunn – Paul Grey – Altier Production
3. The Last Unicorn – Presented by Karen Garman’s Creative Dancing Productions – Valerie Johnson Chior Director

Hesitation Blues from "What Kind of Blue is This? played on KTYD-FM, Blues Breakers show with Jimmy Mac

Photos

Bio

Born in the San Francisco Bay area, Valerie spent eight years polishing her voice as she toured Europe with the Bitburg Gospel Messengers and sang gospel and blues in the Far East. In 1998 she also sang lead on tour with the band that was made famous by Janis Joplin - BIG BROTHER AND THE HOLDING COMPANY. Often also compared to Etta James, Valerie is a genuinely original talent with a direct line into the spirit of the Blues. She has also sung with BOOGIE WOOGIE PIANO QUEEN DEANNA BOGART and the award-winning blues/gospel group the HOLMES BROTHERS.

Al B Blue dishes up hypnotic, funky, driving rhythms on his guitar. Watch out when he pulls out that dobro with his slide... the wondrous sounds will stop you in your tracks! Al B. Blue also is a classically trained pianist, and back in the 50's, formed a street corner doo-wop group in Camden, NJ, where he and his buds took street-corner crooning all the way to the radio! Later in California, he picked up the guitar, paid his dues and started playing major clubs in Los Angeles. From there he joined BIG BLACK AND THE CONGREGATION, an Afro-funk band, then toured the West Coast with CURTIS MAYFIELD. Later, he was offered a position playing with a blues band touring the infamous chitlin circuit. Thats where his blues began and let me tell you - It will never end!

Valerie Johnson & Al B Blue are part of a blues presentation at the Smithsonian Institute. They also have a program that has toured nationwide called BLUES FOR KIDS teaching kids from 2 to 92 about the Blues - their way of keeping the Blues "alive and showing kids how to use the Blues to express their feelings and just have fun! Here are some of the places they have performed: Sonora Blues Festival, Sonora Christmas Craft Faire, Blues & Brews Festival, California Mid-State Fair, along with many other festivals, Blues Society events, conventions, civic functions, parties and weddings.

In short, with Valerie's earthy, silk-and-steel vocal chords and Al's slick, rootsy guitar work, this duo will immerse you in a happy, sad, silly and glad Sea of Blues! A Val & Al show is a soulful blend spiced up by their reverence for Traditional Jazz, Traditional R&B, Gospel and obvious enjoyment of Blues, Funk and Rock & Roll.
On the flip side, they can get sophisticated; serving up standards and old-school jazz and blues. Between Al's guitar and slide dobro and Val's voice, washboard and ukelele playing, people often think there's a full band playing!

2011 Valerie Johnson

Band Members

Valerie Johnson

Links

Website

Facebook

Last.fm

Reverbnation - Valerie Johnson & Al B Blue

Tech, Rider, Lyrics